Gifted Gifting

Here is a little slice of my life for yall.

My indulgence for myself this month was 2 books on the PNW, the setting of most of my (full length) stories. A book about the flora and fauna and the geology of the area. The other was an adult coloring book of the same.

Do you know they don't have fireflies as we know them throughout that region? I'm so glad I researched that before I included them in a pastoral scene! I really was looking to see when they appear there, being that region is north of me, and happily saved myself from an inaccuracy. (So happy!)

Anyway, it made me think since so many of my stories are in that setting, I needed a good reference book at hand. (Google leads me down too many rabbit holes.) 
I thought the coloring book would help me become more familiar with the wildlife especially if I use the pictures in the other book as guidelines. Easier for descriptions and environments and other details.

So, I ordered the books.

Now, you may know I have a granddaughter.
This beautiful child (while I can still get away with calling her that-- she's about to turn 15.) If you've followed this blog, or looked at many of my pictures on Facebook, you have seen this child's work.
She is as gifted in her art as I am in mine (I say modestly)
Her art is not the same as mine.
I draw my scenes with words.

She actually draws her scenes.

For a long time now, she has mostly drawn people. Anime to start. Actually it was Sponge Bob to start, almost as soon as she could walk and talk, and hold a pencil, pen, crayon, or chalk. But she has advanced past sponge bob, and even passed beginner's anime. 

She drew a couple pictures of her mother, from photographs. So lovely.

She has tried landscapes. 

She can't help what colors and lines flow from her fingertips  any more than I can do more than direct the barrage of words that flow through mine. 

She was with me this weekend, and I showed her my coloring book, and while looking through it she seems to have fallen in love with the pictures. You could almost see her mind adding in the colors -- with her alcohol based markers, specifically. So she instantly knew the medium she'd use, and was applying colors as I arrange words at such times.

It's not often our gifts arrange themselves in such harmonious fashion., and those times will become even more rare as we both age.

Perhaps someday she will illustrate my books.
Or create backdrops or CGI images for productions of said books.
What a nice family connection that would be for future generations.

So
Happy Birthday (early) Hailey, and ENJOY.
Enjoy using your Gift with my gift to you. 

And I'm gonna buy another coloring book. 

Christmas Calm

 This is my Christmas tree. Today is January 4. The tree has been up since the day after Thanksgiving. As usual.

As you can see, there are gifts waiting, for my sisters and mostly for my grandkids. 

I like looking at these gifts, ready and waiting for the children.

There are no spectacular gifts this year; at least I don't think so. They had no burning desires for anything special, except Warren wanted a real robot. I left that to Santa.

These are gifts that say "I love you." and maybe even "the silliest things make me think of you." Special for no other reason than that.

I had an opportunity to take their gifts to them on Christmas Eve, but they weren't wrapped. And they would be on Christmas break from their schools. Surely we'd somehow get together in that time.

But it did not happen. 

Life got in the way, with all its complications and contradictions. Illness, wellness, work, cars, the current pandemic. (Current for nearly two years now. That's a long time for a "right now" event, don't you think?) All sorts of stuff; the 'stuff' of daily living. 

Life got in the way.

Once upon a time, this would have infuriated me, or insulted me, or any of many intense negative emotional reactions. 

But I'm not mad.

They'll get them sometime.

When life allows.

In the meantime, I can look at the gifts and be pleased that I have gifts for them. There have been times -- many, many times -- when that couldn't didn't happen. 

I can wait for the giving. 

I can wait for the children.

I can wait for life to return to normal, or something approaching that.

Life will never be normal again.

Too much has changed.

But love doesn't.

The joy of giving doesn't.

That is the normal I can wait for.

Christmas is Coming, Full steam

This year Christmas will be a mess. It will be sad, because of Rex's absence. I'm already missing the shopping marathon -- the one day of the year he would go out and do some real shopping. How he enjoyed buying things! Although he admittedly never cared for the shopping part of it.
He never cared for a lot of the associated things. He liked watching the kids open presents. He liked buying presents. He liked when his other daughter would visit, and was often hurt that he was alone in that. He liked having a good buffet laid out. (He would have preferred a meal, but with no set time for visitors and visiting, he came to appreciate the cold cut tray and the veggie tray and the devilled eggs. He loved his devilled eggs. Even when they weren't so tasty.

Anyway, Christmas will be different this year for us.

The biggest difference will be the gifts not here for the kids. Well, for Hailey. Warren's never had a Christmas, so he won't miss anything. Hailey will miss it for him, though. She knows how it's supposed to be.
I do have some things put away for the kids, and will spend a little to get some things. I have one substantial gift for Babby, bought before the Bad Thing happened. I'm hoping to find something equal for Hailey-Girl.
Don't know when, don't know how, but I have faith in the magicks of the Season. I've seen it all fall into place too many times. (Or seen what looked like disaster turn into the highlight of the day.)
Yes, I have faith, and I will keep my eyes open. And, I hope, my heart.

Christmas is coming for me and for my girls, and for the babies, and for the whole wide world, even those who call it by other names.

For us, here, even the weather has been doing its job in making spirits bright.
Snow and ice, ice and snow.
Lights reflecting and a frosty glow.
It's cold, cold, cold

We will welcome it with all the love we have to give.

That is what matters

Playing Games

I just recently started playing games on Facebook beyond Words With Friends and Scrabble, both which allow you to choose your opponents, one at a time.

Now, I have had those annoying posts about someone needing keys and maps and send a chicken and whatever.  I have been over-zealously invited to become an inhabitant of innumerable "--world"s. I've been Facebook notified that I have 50 new notifications only to find 45 are game related. That's so disappointing.

So, before I ventured into the gaming world, I promised myself (and my 'friends') that I was not going to be that player.
That's easier said than done.
I have had to quit  two games because they demand that I make demands on my friends.

I made my brave venture with the Criminal Case game. It's mostly finding objects in a scene, but there are also puzzles and maze-y things and fill in the rest of the number.
The best/most interesting aspect of this game is that they kind of toss you in with people from your own friends list. For the most part, you get to play with people who are already playing, even to the sending of energy and cards and things. Criminal Case has a nice little list of who you know that already play.
Later on, you do get a list of everyone to send requests to, but it's easy enough to edit that list. And it happens at intervals, not after every play.
BUT -- right now, Criminal Case keeps trying to give me free stuff. To get all this free stuff, I just have to give them my banking or credit card information.
How stupid are people?
The game can still be played though, without the incessant nagging to add or invite. I do enjoy playing.

So, I ventured to Candy Crush. I played to level "youneedkeys" and had to quit. I will not send to every single person on the list and I have no idea which of my friends are playing that game and which aren't. Well, I do know 2 of the people. One is a friend, the other is someone I'd rather not play games with.

So, there's an end to that.

The other game that I have almost quit playing is Words of Wonder. Talk about a nightmare!

The game itself is fine, and enjoyable, and challenging, but it has turned into pages and pages of friends sending energy and gifts. These generous givers include absolute utter and complete strangers!
Not only is the game letting people I don't know know something about me (that I play that game), it is still insisting that I send similar generous gifts to everyone on my list (and their lists, too, I suppose, if they come to look at the game.)

Nope, not doing it.
Not sending or accepting anything else, because the game makes that part of it work -- picking and choosing from the donors -- before you get anywhere near the game itself. And then again between levels or chapters or episodes.

Listen, Facebook Game Designers: Games are supposed to be FUN! Not work.

Definitely not work through many lists many times a visit.

If they could all be like Criminal Case --I hope it stays that way. (I'm only at level 20 or so.)
List the friends who  already play, offer the option to invite others only at certain times. If they did that, fewer people would complain, and a few more might even actually play, if they can do so with relative privacy and no nagging.

Then we could all just play the games that interest us, and we could even -- GASP -- have fun doing so!